Former Attorney-General of India Goolam Essaji Vahanvati passed away at a private hospital here on Tuesday evening following a cardiac arrest. Earlier in the day, Vahanvati who had been suffering from a lung infection, was rushed to Kokilaben Dhirubhai Ambani Hospital, where he died at 6 pm.
Vahanvati, the 13th Attorney-General of India, who was the first Muslim to occupy the top law officer’s post in the country, was 65 and is survived by his wife and son. Vahanvati was appointed as the Attorney-General of India by the UPA-II Government for a three-year term in June 2009. After he completed his stint in office on June 2012, the Manmohan Singh dispensation extended his term by another two years. He had earlier served the Union Government as its Solicitor-General.
Before his appointment as its Solicitor-General by the UPA-I Government in 2004, Vahanvati had been the Advocate General of Maharashtra, a position to which he had risen to after practising for three years in the Bombay High Court. Vahanvati resigned on May 27 this year after the BJP-led Narendra Modi Government assumed office at the Centre. In early 2011, Vahanvati found himself in a controversy over his role in the 2G spectrum scam. In September 2011 the CBI gave Vahanvati ‘a clean chit’ as it filed a status report before the Supreme Court during a 2G Spectrum case hearing.
later in April 2013, Vahanvati’s integrity as the top law officer came under a shadow for allegedly misrepresenting facts in a case relating to the coalgate scandal. This had followed allegations of impropriety and coercion made against him by his junior law officer Haarin P Raval, who resigned from his post as the Additional Solicitor General. Born on May 7, 1949, Vahanvati obtained a law degree from Government law College in Mumbai after graduating from St Xavier’s College.